Dilemma
by Scandalacious Intentions
Summary: AU. Faced with being the most conspicuous student at Hogwarts, Teddy begins to feel the pressure. Luckily, he's more of a Black than he thinks. Two-shot.
1. Dilemma

**Disclaimer: If this was mine, this would be cannon.**

**A/N: Requiem fic-verse but you needn't have read it.  
****A/N 2: My fiftieth fanfiction (which I did say would be **_**Wicked**_** but I'm having too much trouble with the story I already have over there) but you didn't need to know that.**

_Ted Remus Lupin  
__The attic bedroom  
__Sleepy Cottage  
__Hope Cove_

_Devon_

_Dear Mr. Lupin.  
__We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary supplies and equipment. Term begins September 1st__. We await your owl by no less than July 31__st__._

_Nicholas Loveland_

_Deputy Headmaster._

"I'm actually frightened that this man knows where I sleep." Teddy re-read the letter. "Ooh, can I have an owl?"

"Why? To peck him if he comes a-creeping?"

"Not funny."

Tonks evidently thought she was, giggling to herself as she wrapped her arms around her son's neck and kissed the mop of purple hair. "We'll see."

Lupin hummed dubiously, stirring yet another lump of sugar into his tea. "I've got a perfectly good one." In truth, he had not quite become used to the fact that both he and his wife were now earning and spent his time hoarding money away in case Kingsley changed his mind and did a Dolores on him. "We can share."

Tonks rolled her eyes. "Spoilsport. We'll go to Diagon Alley later, and we'd better sort out that owl back too."

"It's all right. I've spoken to Minerva."

Tonks smirked. "Thank Merlin. Heaven forbid we waste ink and parchment."

Lupin glared back half-heartedly, the smile playing on his lips. "You can laugh now-"

"-but come 2012 when we're living in an underground bunker and society is collapsing around us, we'll be glad of it."

Lupin raised his eyebrows at his daughter who was trying not to grin back at her brother. "Shut up and eat your toast." He ruffled her curls as he passed and Emma groaned, flattening them and frowning.

"I could take a half-day," said Tonks, pacing slightly. "If we got going quickly, I could be there by one."

Teddy smiled somewhat sinisterly. "If you're busy, I could go with Harry."

Lupin took a sip of tea and raised an eyebrow. "No. No way. I know what'll happen. The pair of you will come home with an owl and a broomstick and a solid gold cauldron and neither of you will have gone within ten yards of Flourish and Blotts. _I_ will take you shopping for school supplies. Dora, why don't you go in and take a half day so you can _leave _at one and then we'll have lunch together? I'll leave all the exciting things for the afternoon."

Teddy grinned. "Like Quality Quidditch Supplies?"

Lupin sighed and raised his eyes to the heavens as though calling upon God to answer. "All right."

"What's your problem with that shop?"

He drained his mug. "My problem, Teddy, is that every time we go in, I end up forking out more money than I'm comfortable parting with."

Tonks grinned. "It's the only time two handfuls of coins leave your dad's wallet at the same time."

Lupin laughed. "I could go off you, you know."

Tonks smiled sweetly. "You're not fooling anyone. Anyway, I'd better get going. Give Mummy a kiss." Emma hopped off her chair and wrapped her arms around her mother's neck, kissing her cheek. Teddy raised an eyebrow. "No. Just no."

Tonks smirked back at him and wrapped an arm around his neck, slightly reminiscent of a headlock, and dropped an exaggerated, noisy, wet kiss on his cheek which Teddy immediately wiped off. She left another and Disapparated.

"So when do you want to go?"

Teddy looked as though he had come down with a fatal disease. "Promise me she won't do that in public."

Lupin rolled his eyes. "Next time, just give her a kiss. Can you be ready by half past nine?"

Teddy grabbed his last piece of toast and ran up two flights of stairs, still heard by his father as he pottered around his bedroom, a conversion of the second attic (the first still used by his father as a storage room for his junk).

"Can I come?"

Emma's quiet doting upon the bookshop for its musty leather covers and fresh paper smell and sound of hurried page turning, was no secret and yet Lupin was somewhat reluctant to allow her to join them. He was tempted to cancel with his wife too because this was something he felt he and his son ought to do together.

"You don't want to stay with Grammy?"

Emma shook her head. "I want to buy the new one in the Scarlet series. I've been saving for forever. Can I come? Please, Dad, please."

He was instantly reminded of himself at her age, devouring Dahl's _The Twits_ and Tolkien's _The Hobbit_ sitting as she did on the same battered sofa, eating Chocoballs and listening to his mother shout at the dog in the background.

"Of course you can come."

"Thanks, Dad."

"But you might want to change out of your pyjamas; fetching as they are."

No sooner had Emma bounded out of the room, heading for the room that used to belong to her father, Teddy hovered in the doorway, wearing a bright green Harpies T-shirt which clashed spectacularly with the shade of purple he had chosen for his hair.

"Dad, what will they say to me?"

Lupin looked up from the dishes he was currently charming to hover towards the sink. "What will _who _say to you?"

"You know, people…at school."

Lupin had been dreading this conversation, indeed even dreading the thought entering his son's mind. "If they say anything, Ted, you just have to grin and bear it, I'm afraid. You can come to me and I won't be offended by any of the insults. I'm sure I'll have heard worse, and-"

Teddy was horrified. "They're going to be horrible to me?"

Lupin sighed. "It's a possibility, Ted. Lycanthropy still isn't-"

"Not about you being a werewolf, about you being my Dad."

Lupin laughed with relief. "I'm sure people will only be vaguely amused if they're in your Charms class and even then they'll forget about it after the lesson. What's it to them anyway? I'm not going to show favouritism."

"Damn."

Lupin's smile faltered. "And if they _do_ bring my disease up-"

"I'll break their noses. Mum showed me how to do it without hurting my knuckles."

Lupin's eyes widened. "All right…um…I think your mother and I need to have a little chat when we get home. Ted, if you have any problems, come to me. Now, come on, let me see that list of yours."

_Standard Book of Spells Grade 1 - Miranda Goshawk  
__Defensive Charms for Beginners - Cornelia Robins.  
__A History of Magic - Bathilda Bagshot  
__Magical Theory - Adalbert Waffling  
__Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration - Emeric Switch  
__One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi - Phyllida Spore  
__Magical Draughts and Potions - Arsenius Jigger  
__Dragon's Blood and Your Herbaceous Border - Nicholas Loveland.  
__The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self Protection - Quentin Trimble  
__Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them - Newt Scamander_

"Oh, Nick's adding his own books onto the list? Fair enough. I suppose he can live off the royalties alone these days." Lupin turned to his son. "Have you read _13_? It's brilliant. I've got a copy; I'll lend it to you and he'll be hugely impressed."

Teddy frowned. "Isn't he a teacher?"

Lupin nodded. "Took over from Professor McGonagall. He teaches Transfiguration _and _he's Head of Ravenclaw. You remember Nick. He came round for dinner last week."

"Yeah, but he's not another Lockhart, is he?"

Lupin laughed. "Harry exaggerates that story. Professor Loveland is nothing like that."

The questions continued even as they walked along Diagon Alley, Lupin promising Emma they would come back to Amanuensis Quills, Flourish and Blotts and Scribblus Writing Instruments, while Teddy stared longingly into the windows of Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes and Slug and Jigger's Apothecary.

"So what does the Sorting Hat do?" asked Teddy, his eyes not leaving the alarming contraption in George's window.

"It puts you in the best place for you. I wanted to be a Ravenclaw," said Lupin, "but it had other ideas," he added darkly. "And it doesn't listen."

Teddy stared at his father, horrified, though finally able to remove his gaze from the display. "What if it puts me in Slytherin?"

Lupin laughed and wrapped an arm around his son's shoulders. "I don't know why we still have that house, to be honest. No-one wants to be in it. I wouldn't worry about it, Ted, places in Slytherin tend to be reserved by the Malfoys. All right, where shall we start?"

"Potions stuff!"

As long as he lived, Lupin was sure to wonder where his son's enthusiasm for Potions came from. Certainly he had not inherited it from him. His first choice had been Flourish and Blotts and then Ollivander's.

"Okay. Let's start with your cauldron."

Lupin was filled with horror almost as soon as he crossed the threshold, feeling fourteen and dreading the use of the ingredients on his list, but he watched his son debating the merits of a collapsible cauldron as opposed to a pewter cauldron and couldn't help but smile.

"It says pewter, you see, but I'm not sure I'll get that in my trunk."

"Go for collapsible," said Lupin, wondering why he was advising anybody on this particular subject. The poor boy would have been better off asking the cauldron itself for all the use he was. "It looks a bit cooler."

_Dried Nettles  
__Crushed Snake Fangs  
__Stewed Horned Slugs  
__Porcupine Quills  
__Lacewing Flies  
__Newt's Tails_

Emma gagged stepping into the Apothecary and clutched her father's hand as she encountered a jar of fish eyes, whimpering as she did so.

"You don't like them either?"

"Dad, they're looking at me."

Lupin chuckled but squeezed her hand reassuringly. "Listen, Ted, here's five galleons. Get what you need and please don't improvise with your ingredients. Emma and I will wait outside."

He needn't have worried that his son would be offended as Teddy obviously thought this was the coolest thing imaginable, consulting his list and making his way along the isles.

Teddy bounded out, swinging a paper bag and beaming, his hair now a royal purple. "Where now?"

Lupin smiled at him, accepting his change. "I was rather hoping you'd tell me."

"Ollivander's!"

Finally something in common. Though, as excited as he had been at eleven, Lupin found himself terribly unsettled by Mr. Ollivander, who seemed to know a frightening amount of information and his eyes were decidedly creepy.

"Ah, Remus, eleven inches, maple and unicorn hair."

Lupin nodded and tried not to let his fear show. He gripped his daughter's hand, knowing he would have to come here again.

"And this must be your boy."

Mr. Ollivander headed to the back of his shop, muttering to himself, and Teddy's wide eyes made contact with his father's. Lupin nodded and bit back a smile.

"Try this one."

Teddy accepted the offered wand and held it at arms length as though about to attempt to diffuse it.

"Go on. Give it a wave."

Whole shelves collapsed and wands sprung out of their cases, all aiming themselves at Mr. Ollivander's head. Teddy grinned. "That's the one for me."

"Let's try another, shall we." It was a statement, not a question. "There you go."

If it had been bad the first time, the second was horrendous as dust, wood chippings and wooden cases rained down upon them.

"All right, third time lucky." Ollivander disappeared into the very back of his shop and Teddy turned to his father.

"What if I'm a squib?"

Emma laughed and was silenced with a sharp glance from her father.

"You're not a squib, Ted. The wand wouldn't do anything if you were a squib. Besides, look what you can do with your appearance. It might seem normal to you, but it's magic." Lupin smiled softly. "It took me nine attempts. I think my dad was on the verge of a heart attack." He leant down. "Everyone thought that because I was a dark creature, I couldn't use something as pure as Unicorn hair or Pheonix feather. Even my own father was surprised."

"Right. Ready?"

Teddy nodded and accepted the long, think piece of wood, feeling a tingle in his fingers as a white light shone at the end. Ollivander smiled with what Lupin recognised as relief.

"Nine inches. That's Hawthorn like your mother's and Unicorn hair."

Lupin grinned, the first time Teddy had seen him happy to empty his pockets, and pulled his son onto the street, almost at a run, returning comfortingly to character and steering him deftly past Gambol and Japes.

"Madam Malkin's now and then off to buy some books before we meet Mum."

Teddy was horrified. "It's only half past eleven."

"Yes, and there'll probably be a queue in Malkin's," said Lupin. "You'll be there until at least twelve."

Teddy stared after his father. "And then we have a whole hour!"

"Ted," said Emma, "it's Flourish and Blotts."

Teddy stalked after them, his hair now a deep aubergine. "I know what the shop's called, thanks."

* * *

"Mum!"

Tonks beamed and embraced her son, changing her hair colour to match his. "Where have you been? What have you got?"

"All my Potions things and a telescope and some scales and a _wand_, Mum."

Tonks clasped his hands. "What is it?"

"Look." He pulled it out. "It's like yours."

Lupin met his wife's eyes. "We share a core." He smiled smugly. "And he's going to be top of my class."

"And then we spent a whole hour surrounded by books." Tonks winced sympathetically. "And Dad kept telling me not to buy anything in case he still had some copies at home."

"Remus."

Lupin raised his hands in surrender. "I might still have some at home and I was a good little annotator. You might find something useful in them." Teddy grinned, seeing the merits of doing less work. "See? Your old dad knows what he's doing." He softened. "Still, you probably deserve an ice cream. Fancy it?"

Teddy beamed and nodded. "Can I come with you?"

Lupin raised his eyebrows. "You thought I was going to carry four ice creams on my own?"

"Can I come?"

Tonks sighed softly, understanding the glint in Teddy's eyes. "Why don't you stay with me? I haven't seen my little pixie all day." She tucked a red curl behind her daughter's ear. "And I've missed her."

Teddy, relieved that he was now able to have 'Dad-time', beamed at his mother and ran to catch up with Lupin.

"Dad?"

"Yeah?"

Teddy bit his lip. "What if I don't make any friends?"

Lupin stopped, turning to face his son, and placed his hands on his shoulders. "Ted, there are a thousand people in Hogwarts. You would have to be seriously obnoxious for not _one_ of them to like you."

Teddy gave him a half-smile in response. "But say that they don't, what then?"

Lupin shrugged. "Even Peter had friends, Ted, and he was a nervous little coward with horrendous teeth. You _will_ make friends." He picked up his pace once more and wrapped his arm around his son's shoulders. "I never really told you about me and James and Sirius, did I? About how we started out."

Teddy shook his head. Though James, Sirius and even Peter had played a huge part in entertaining him on miserable afternoons, he knew nothing about how they had met.

"Well," said Lupin, smiling oddly, "they absolutely detested me."

"Really? Why?"

Lupin laughed. "I spent the majority of my time with my head in a book and I used to stutter. And even then, we became friends within forty-eight hours. Sirius realised I was sarcastic and a bit of a bitch, traits I think he recognised in himself." Teddy grinned. "And I was good at Charms - the only subject he could never really get the hang of, which I think might have swayed him a bit too." Lupin winked at his son. "And he was just the sort of person I would tell you to stay well away from so pick someone you think you'll hate and go and say hello, is my advice."

Teddy gave him another half-smile. "What do you think I should do about my hair and stuff?"

Lupin smiled sadly. "I don't know, Ted. That's a decision you'll have to make for yourself."

"What would _you_ do?"

Though Lupin was flattered that he was the first person his son would choose to model himself upon, he was slightly disconcerted. He sighed deeply.

"The truth?"

Teddy nodded.

"I'd hide it. I would hide it to hide behind it when I needed it." His smile was wide now. "But you're not me. You're brave and you're funny and you're exciting and above all, you don't care what anyone thinks of you. You're nothing like me. You get everything from the Blacks. You and your mother, you're emotional doubles of one another."

Teddy laughed and allowed his father to press him closer to his side.

"And I wouldn't have you any other way." Lupin frowned slightly, pensive and just a little nostalgic. "So since you're only a Lupin by name, I would pick the most violent, most offensive shade you can think of and just stroll around as though there is absolutely nothing odd about you."

Teddy's eyes widened and he grinned slowly. "Dad, you're a genius!" Changing his hair to acid green and forcing a wince from his father, Teddy immediately began debating his next dilemma.

Bubblegum or Raspberry Ripple?


	2. Resolution

**Disclaimer: No. Still not mine.**

**A/N: For those who asked for it. These guys will probably later feature in another fic.**

**A/N 2: To those who have read Daring Nerve and Chivalry, Where Dwell the Brave at Heart and particularly The Gospel According to Lupin, I wonder if you'll guess who his friend is. She may be a McCormack but she is so much like her mother…**

_1__st__ September 2009_

With a packed trunk, his father's owl (for appearance's sake) and acid green hair, Teddy Lupin was ready to face almost anything. He had been tempted to give himself a tattoo and an eyebrow piercing just to be absolutely certain that no-one was going to make a comment about his beloved father - not to his face, at least.

Lupin had quickly put that idea to bed.

"Dad, what if it puts me in Slytherin?"

Lupin sighed and smiled down at his son. "So what? I know lots of perfectly lovely Slytherins, very academic, very high-flyers, innately nice."

Teddy raised an eyebrow, blatantly rather dubious. "Really?"

"Well, no, but you could be the first."

Teddy managed a faint smile, though he was now feeling very sick indeed. He spared a hug and a kiss for his mother, almost ignoring his father for fear that other people see them together.

"Bye, Teddy."

Teddy winked at his sister. "See you, pipsqueak."

"Come and see me after school tomorrow," Lupin murmured, conscious that his son's fears of being detected as a teacher's son were worse than ever before, handing over the caged barn owl. "And be nice to him."

Teddy nodded and took a deep breath, dragging his trunk with one hand and swinging the disgruntled owl's cage in the other. It was easier now, without his father beside him, looking like him and talking like him and standing like him and…being obviously related to him.

"OW!"

Teddy peered into the carriage. "Hello?"

The boy stood up, pushing his trunk back against the wall. "Bloody thing." He had a thick Liverpool accent and skin the colour of milk chocolate, but Teddy was captivated by his eyes - the same colour as his father's.

"Sorry, man." He stuck out his hand. "I'm Tom. Tom Collins. Is this your first year too?"

Teddy grinned and nodded, shaking Tom's hand. This had taken no time. "Like the cocktail?"

Tom sighed. "Yeah."

"Sorry, I bet you get that all the time."

Tom smirked. "No, first time I've ever heard it."

Teddy laughed. "Oh, I'm Ted, by the way."

"Cool hair. Did your folks let you dye it?"

Teddy beamed at him. "Do you want to see something cool?" He changed his hair to his favourite shade of purple and back again.

For a moment, Tom was silent and Teddy began to think he should have kept his gift to himself but the other boy's jaw dropped and he grinned.

"That's dead good."

Teddy laughed. "But, yeah, my parents let me do pretty much anything…except drugs. I don't think I'd get away with that. Do you…um…do you want to find a compartment?"

Tom nodded. "If I can shift this damn trunk. I might have to sit out 'ere on my tod."

Teddy shook his head. "It's really weird how we're speaking the same language and I don't understand a word you say."

"On my own, you dozey get." He opened the nearest door. "'Ere's one."

Inside, sat a tall girl with jet black hair and piercing electric blue eyes. She raised her eyebrows and put down _Witch Weekly_, obviously thinking that the two boys were far more entertaining.

"Oh, hello."

The girl pursed her lips in reply and returned to her magazine, flicking through the fashion pages and humming to herself.

"I'm Teddy."

"Erin," she replied, her gaze not leaving the page.

Teddy frowned slightly. "Are you Scottish?"

Erin sighed and slammed her magazine onto the table separating them. "Why? What's it to you?"

Teddy held his hands up in surrender. "I just wondered why you came to London to go back to Scotland."

Erin sat up straight. "Well, I wasn't going to _walk_ to Hogwarts and the flying carpet's gone in for it's M.O.T." She flicked the page over. "What have you done to your hair?"

Teddy smirked. "Oh, do you like it?"

Erin returned to her icy silence.

Tom blew the air out of his cheeks and took the seat opposite her. "What's your problem, love?"

Erin peered over the top of her page, fixing Tom with her incredibly blue eyes and silencing him, seemingly holding him in a trance. "Are you talking to me?"

"No, I was talking to Jabba the Hut."

Finally, she put down her magazine and leant across the table. "What the hell is Jabba the Hut?"

Teddy, exposed to his father's nerdy tendencies from a very young age, replied, "A really fat alien." The silence deafened him, ringing in his ears. "What House do you think you'll be in?"

Tom hummed for what felt like ten hours. "Hufflepuff. That's where they put everyone who doesn't know where they're going."

Teddy smiled strangely. "My Mum was a Hufflepuff."

Tom winced. "What was your Dad?"

Teddy cleared his throat and mumbled, "Gryffindor." _And he's totally not the Head of it._

"Oh, go for that one, I would. Still, even Hufflepuff's better than Slytherin. It's got the shadiest characters in it. Half of Azkaban were in Slytherin."

Erin made a slightly nasal sound but pressed the subject no further.

"What about you, Erin?"

"Slytherin."

"Oh."

Well, this was awkward. Teddy fidgeted. He wasn't sure if he and Tom were really friends and Erin seemed to despise him. He remembered what his father had said about Sirius, and opted to talk her into submission.

"Is that where your parents were?"

Erin nodded.

"Did they see you off or did the Dementors not let them out for the day?"

Teddy stared at Tom, his mouth agape. "You've got some nerve, aye."

Erin stuffed the magazine into the pocket of her robes. "For your information, my mother and father fought against Voldemort during the war, and er…just so you know, Dementors don't guard Azkaban anymore so if you're going to insult my family, at least do it properly."

"So who _are_ your family?"

Erin glanced toward Teddy. "You know, I think maybe a darker green would have suited you."

"What? Like this?" His hair was now emerald and Erin raised her eyebrows, leaning back in her chair.

"That's um…useful, I suppose."

Teddy grinned. "Very. My Mum's a Metamorphagus." He might as well come out with it. "And my Dad's the Charms teacher."

Tom winced. "Oh, that is going be dead awkward. You're going to look like a right bell-end, mate."

"Thanks, Tom, I really appreciate your support."

Tom shrugged. "I'm just saying. Tough love, Ted. Tough love."

Erin's response was considerably more detached. "And who is your father?"

"Remus Lupin."

Tom gasped. "No way! I've got his Chocolate Frog card. I've got the whole Order. And Circe. I've got five of her. Oh, and Merlin, and I thought I saw an Agrippa one once. They're really hard to find."

Erin met Teddy's eyes and rolled hers. He grinned at her.

"This is Tom."

Erin nodded and held out her hand. "Erin McCormack."

Tom, surprised by her sudden display of friendship, took her hand and shook it loosely.

"They say the way to spot a big girl's blouse is by a loose handshake," said Erin, smiling at him.

Tom smiled back. "Sorry about…you know."

"It's all right. I've had a lot worse. A lot truer too."

Teddy decided not to ask. Though, of course, he could not speak for Tom; sadly.

"Like what?"

* * *

It came as no surprise that he was placed in Gryffindor. Though, as Erin took her seat opposite him, plainly the only person unsurprised was indeed Erin.

"I thought you were going to be a Slytherin," said Tom, halfway through a chicken leg, some time later when the shock had evidently sunk in.

Erin's expression was one of vague disgust. "So did I. Still, my half-uncle was here and my mother kept telling me how she _should_ have been." She turned to a girl on her right. "Can you pass the feta? I'm Erin."

Teddy and Tom shared an incredulous look. She certainly hadn't been this approachable on the train. Perhaps she was only pleasant to other beautiful people who radiated 'Ice Queen'.

"Galateia."

"This is Thomas, you'll probably want to avoid him." Tom glared at her across the table and Erin smirked back. "And Ted, who doesn't seem so bad because he's barely had the chance to speak with Tom around. Oh, and he can do things with his hair."

Galateia smiled. "Yes, I can see."

"He's a Metamorphagus," said Tom, shoveling mashed potatoes into his mouth. "Cool, isn't it?"

Erin wrinkled her nose. "I really don't want to see the contents of your mouth, but yes, I have to agree."

Teddy beamed at her. "And, it's not a good look, Tom."

Tom elbowed him and returned to eating, a task all of itself. It was distinctly reminiscent of feeding time for a Piranha.

"Good God, boys disgust me."

Galateia nodded. "You can't even taste that, surely."

Tom merely continued to shovel them down. "I haven't eaten all day. I was too nervous."

Erin's face betrayed no hint of amusement. "No. Far too nervous to eat five Chocolate Frogs, six cauldron cakes and two boxes of Every Flavour Beans."

Galateia's mouth dropped open. "How are you so thin? That's what I want to know. Merlin, boys get away with everything."

"Because we're not so obsessed," said Tom. "Pass me the sausages."

* * *

"I'll meet you later."

Tom smirked, knowing that straight after their Charms lesson, his new best friend was about to approach his father. "I'll wait outside."

Teddy waited for the room to empty, packing his things away slowly. He wondered how to approach his father who had almost ignored his very existence for the past hour, but he was surprised to find Lupin sitting on his desk and beckoning him over.

"How was your day?"

Teddy nodded and beamed. "Good. How was yours?"

Lupin laughed. "Disturbing." He gave his son a half-smile. "I see you made friends."

"Oh yeah, Tom's so funny and Tia's cool, but Erin's a bit…"

"Detached?"

Teddy nodded. "Yeah, that's exactly it. Did you get the feeling she hated you?"

Lupin nodded. "I'm sure she just takes a bit of getting used to."

"A bit, yeah. So what do you think?"

Lupin smiled. "It's not about what I think. You obviously like them and they obviously like you. I don't feature into the equation at all."

"But do you like them?"

Lupin nodded. "Oh, especially Tom. Very entertaining."

Teddy laughed. "I'm sure he didn't mean it. It's just a black eye. Erin can get that fixed so easily."

Lupin scoffed. "Just a black eye? I don't know how it's possible to be that clumsy and I'm married to your mother. I live with _you_."

"I'm not clumsy!" Teddy protested.

Lupin raised an eyebrow. "Ted." He shifted his papers, straightening them out and locking them away in a drawer. "Still, you're nothing like Calamity Collins. Come on, before we miss dinner."

"Hi, Sir."

"Evening, Tom."

Teddy rolled his eyes. "You're such a fan-boy, Tom, it's unreal." Turning to his father, he said, "I think he wants your autograph. If he asks for a really disturbing book from the Restricted Section, don't worry; he doesn't really want it, he's just going to sleep with the slip under his pillow."

Tom elbowed him. "Shut up."

"You shut up."

As much as he tried not to compare them, Lupin could not help but think of James and Sirius.


End file.
